I was responding to the last post by StudentBluff2.
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PUG #6, catching a bluff with Ace-high
Same table as hand PUG #5, I’m holding ATo on the button, but also in the SB because it’s heads-up. A third player has joined the table. I open to 4bb, the new player at the table is ineligible to play the hand.
Flop 2s4d4h. V checks, I check back.
Turn 6c. Check, check.
River. 2h, for board 2 pair. V bets pot. I feel pretty sure V isn’t holding a 2 or a 4, and probably not a 6, given the line they’ve run, so my A-kicker on Two Pair 4422 is presumably good. I call, V shows Jh8d, and I have caught their bluff with A-high.
@StudentBluff2 You’re assuming you are behind here, but a 9x with a club or a worse queen is probably going to play the same way. An ace should probably raise pre-flop from the btn when limp/checked to. If this is a player who won’t raise an ace, I think it’s also safe to assume they won’t fold one either, except maybe A2 and A3. So in this case you can probably value bet smaller and get called by worse - almost everything better should be calling.
A lot of flush draws will bet or check raise the flop, so pretending you have the flush is not a particularly convincing story.
I like that you are raising bigger pre-flop, though I actually prefer to bet a bit smaller than this as the button. In general, I’m hoping to make my opponent’s decision as hard as possible, where they are torn between calling or folding. So if my position is bad, my opponents in general will be more inclined to call, and so increasing my raising size makes their decision more difficult. As the button, anyone that calls will be out of position, making them more reluctant to call and then play post flop with that additional disadvantage, and hence betting smaller makes their decision more difficult.
The flop is a bit neutral, with 442 rainbow missing both players ranges most of the time. With ace high, you are mostly ahead here, and a small continuation bet is fine. I also like checking behind here some of the time, as you did.
With the check on the turn, you could again bet somewhere in the smaller end of the spectrum. But the 6 probably favors the defenders range. They have a slightly higher concentration of 22, 44 and 66, and far more combinations of 42, 64 and 53. Still, you are mostly ahead at this point, and can probably get called by worse at a frequency high enough to support a small value bet. I’m still perfectly happy checking back also.
With the pot sized bet, you know only have a bluff catcher. Call some of the time, and fold some of the time. If you know something about your opponents bluffing frequencies, you can modify how often you make the call.
From the villain’s perspective, I don’t think J8 was a good bluffing candidate. I’d prefer hands like 87, 85 and 75 to make this play, at a rate that hopefully gets to 1 bluff for every 2 value. Note that these hands both have less showdown value than J8, and also block some of the hands that will be more likely to call (86, 76 and 56 come to mind). I’d also have been inclined to mostly begin bluffing on the turn, if I want to fire a more polarizing bet on the river. Still, the pot sized bet out of the blue probably reps a 2, and so some bluffs make sense.
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PUG #7
Another hand where I got to call a villain bluff:
1k/2k ring, 4-seat table. I have AcQs in the CO chair, open to 5k, Button calls, SB calls.
Flop Ad3c4c, giving me top pair, good kicker, backdoor flush and wheel draws. SB opens for 1k. This player’s pattern is to bet every hand postflop for 1k, 1k, and then either give up or bet big. I raise to about 2/3 pot, 11k. I want to get value from weaker Aces, as well as protect myself against front door draws that could complete straight or flushes earlier than me.
Button jams all-in for the rest of his 118k stack. SB folds, I call. Button holds Th4h for 2nd pair, and is drawing very thin to 5 outs.
Board runs out 5d, Kc, and I stack them for a pot of 243500.
I was able to make this call because I had observed this player shoving frequently in prior hands, and had called them once previously, when I had AT, flopped a gutshot draw, turned top pair, and called what was this players 3rd or 4th jam; they had air, but then the river filled the straight draw for a board broadway straight that we chopped. I was annoyed at the chop, but knowing they were shoving some junk hands gave me some information I could use later.
The lessons:
- You can bluff like this and get away with it a couple of times, but eventually it’s going to sting you, unless you’re properly balanced. It’s usually not worth it. You might win some small pots where you had near 0% equity, but when you get called you lose your whole stack. Better bluffs are sized to where you’re not putting your entire stack at risk.
- Bluff sizing. Bluffs work best when they aren’t obvious. The sizing should be the same as your value bets, maybe on the bigger side to make it harder to call. If you like big bets, you can bluff big too, but you need to make sure you’re balancing your nut hands with your bluffs, and picking the right spot to make a bluff look credible.
- Don’t bluff (or bluff with reduced frequency) when another player is showing a lot of strength, (unless you have good reason to believe they are bluffing).
If this player hadn’t pulled this move so many times already, I might have given them credit for having flopped a set of 333s or the wheel straight and folded top pair here.
Agree. If opponent had Ace of clubs and another club, at least he would have had outs, but you held the Ace of clubs. He could have had a set of threes or fours, but if he was making a lot of these bluffs, then that increases the probability that he does not.
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Yes, indeed. I saw a video recently which seemed like crazy play in which Daniel Negreanu and his opponent both got all in preflop. Negreanu had 75 and opponent had 76. I believe that both of them believed (correctly) that the other was bluffing and would fold until the final bet.
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I don’t think such a video exists, unless they had 3 blinds each.
No, it was more than that. I would like to post the link to the video but I cannot find it.
My cell phone has a Google page that every day throws up stories and videos that Google thinks would interest me–not just poker–and this video appeared there about 2 weeks ago and I watched it while I was still lying in bed half awake. That’s why I don’t remember the name of the opponent, who was not previously known to me. I would be grateful if someone could find that video and post the link here.
The title was something like Negreanu crazy insane hand, or Negreanu losing it.
YouTube has a history of the videos you’ve watched, and it’s searchable. Maybe you can find it there?
PUG #8
T9o, in the BB at a 3-handed 4-seat table. SB raises to 5BB, I decide to call, we see a flop, K98, two clubs on the board, middle pair for me. SB bets into me for half-pot on each street: 11k, 22k, 44k. Each street I just flat call, until the river, which I raise. The board runs out two more clubs on the Turn and River, making a 4-club board, and I still just have the pair of 9s. When V bets 44k into an 88k pot on the river, I raise to 88k and he quickly folds.
I felt like the only way I could win the hand was if I got him to fold, and that he wasn’t playing his hand like he had a flush. More likely he had Kx, or nothing, something like AX, or possibly a pocket pair without a club.
What gave me the confindence that V didn’t have a flush? The early aggression signaled a strong hand, which gave me the impression he had something good to start with, and was hoping to close the hand before it ran out four clubs.
PUG #9
4-seat ring, 2k/4k. Three seated, I have 65o in the BB. Button folds, SB limps, I check and we see a flop.
I like the flop, 626, rainbow. I likely have the best hand, but this isn’t going to be much of a pot since there wasn’t any preflop action. V probably can’t have much here, but with limping from a blind seat they could have a pretty wide range of almost anything, and given that they only limped and didn’t open, I think it caps them to having mostly garbage. It’s going to be difficult to get any money out of this hand.
Fortunately V bets into me for full pot on the flop. I flat call. I figure this is all but certainly a bluff, and definitely not a better hand than I have here, although sure it’s possible that they could be on a better 6. If they’re on a worse hand, I don’t want to raise them and risk them folding, so that they’ll barrel again on the Turn, and if they’re on a better hand, I don’t want to give them more chips. Raising would only work if V happened to have a strong overpair, which is unlikely given the preflop action. So call it is.
Turn is the 5s. Perfect for me, I now have the absolute nuts with 666s full of 55s, and thanks to the tepid action I’m only going to get a tiny little pot out of it, I think. Fortunately, V bets again, this time for half pot. I once again call. Board is pretty connected, and I’m hoping that they may have a hand like 43 and will bomb the river with it, or at least be strong enough to be willing to call when I raise them.
River is the 3d. If they do have any 4, they have a straight, and I still have the best possible hand here. Sadly, V checks. I decide to see if they’ll go for anything, and try a half-pot bet. I believe this is too much if they had been betting two overcards, they’re giving up, done with the hand now. But maybe they have a hand like A5, A3, or perhaps even trapping with a hand like A4. So I don’t go for a 10% or 20% pot thin value bet, I go for half pot.
V calls, shows 82s, for bottom pair. It still ends up a fairly paltry pot, but…
Somehow I extracted 12BB out of an opponent holding absolute bottom pair, just relying on an overly aggressive player massively overplaying deuces on a low board. I consider this play a bluff on V’s part, up until the river, and their baffling willingness to call down with such a weak hand to be curiously bad, but it’s the type of play I run into very frequently with AQ, so it’s not at all surprising given how much bottom pair will stack me.
Overall this was a pretty big waste of a full house, but I don’t know how I could have played it any differently. I’m certainly not one to raise pre with 65. Even if I’d raised preflop, is 82s calling that much? I suppose they might have, given what I see regularly at the tables, but mostly hands calling an open from the BB are stronger than my holding preflop, and I can’t count on flopping top trips with 65 and then Turning full boat, can I? So I don’t mind the small pot, it was a nice gift, and getting bet into by this player despite having such a weak hand was another gift on top of it.
PUG #10
5k/10k ring, 4-seated. Two players are at the table, one with about 650k, the other with close to 2M. I sit to the left of the player with the big stack, for the regular buy-in of 1M. On the first two hands, the big stack player opens to 6BB, and I’m holding garbage and just fold, and get stung for the SB and BB, also folding garbage.
My only read on these players is that they are ranked worse than 10000th on the site, and are playing at a ring table with far too much of their bankroll. If they’re playing this high up, they’re also likely playing loose and aggressive with their chips, and I should be able to make that pay off.
On the third hand, I’m dealt AJs (diamonds) on the Button. Observing that the big stack has been opening to 6BB, I figure likely they’ll be comfortable calling if I open to 5BB. I open to 50k, SB folds, BB (the big stack) raises to 120k. Super nice. I call, and we see a flop.
Flop 8sAh8h. This is a nice flop for me, but I’m not liking how wet the board is with a pair and two hearts when I have zero hearts. I have AJ-diamonds and it would have been nice to get at least a diamond to keep the flush draw alive. Oh well. Still, unless V happens to have an 8, AQ or AK, I have to have the best hand here a decent amount of the time. Yeah, there’s hands like AQ, AK, AA that could have 3-bet me preflop, and A8 would have me wrecked here, but there’s also hands like 99-KK, and some weaker suited Aces and Kings that could conceivably be 3-bet by a competent player. Overall, I like my hand, and I feel it’s worth showing down with.
V is first to act, and bets into me for a pretty sizeable bet of 142425 chips, and I call. It’s an odd sizing, not a round number or a multiple of BB sizing, and it’s a little over half-pot. The pot odds are fine, though, and I surmise that they are just grabbing the slider and moving it up a rough amount, rather than playing a calculated bet size. This seems loose/sloppy to me, and I read into that as a kind of tell that this player is just trying to be splashy and intimidate me, as they probably have been since they sat at this table. Maybe they have nothing. I don’t want to just lay down with a decent Ace and top pair, but I’m wondering what V could have here.
Turn 2h. Now there are three hearts on the board, and I’m liking this situation less than I did on the flop. V barrels again, overbetting 562k into a pot of 528k. This is a pretty polarizing bet size, either they have an 8, A8, AA, or two hearts, possibly AX hearts, or a high heart drawing to a flush. But I think barrelling aggressively while drawing to a flush with a pair on the board is less likely. Could be he’s overplaying a pocket pair and doesn’t buy that I have an Ace, or is counting on the paired board to make me worry about the strength of top pair. It’s a pretty reasonable way to play with TT-KK if that’s what he has, especially if he has a heart in his hand. I decide that I don’t believe V has a hand as strong as he’s repping, and I’m willing to pay him off if I’m wrong
But I also feel like my hand could use what protection I might be able to get from raising here, not that I have enough left to put a lot of fold pressure on him. I realize this and wish that I’d bought in for the full 2M, because either way if I get him to fold a draw by jamming here, that’s fine, this is plenty chips to win with AA88J as it is, and if I do get him chasing, or overplaying a weaker Ace or weaker pocket pair, then I should try to get all the value out of the hand now. If he is on a flush, I’m drawing thin but still have outs to a full house, not that I can count on them coming in very often. And if he’s on a pocket pair, he’s drawing to two outs to a full house to beat me, which is also very thin, and I can probably expect to win most of the time. So I go all-in, it’s only less than 200k more, and V instacalls.
V flips up Tc9h, he does have nothing, just a hearts draw with one street to go. So I’m happy, but not out of the woods. But this is one of the best situations I considered I could be up against. I really did like V’s play, though – up until he called, at least, which was a mistake on V’s part. I felt less certain of my cards winning this hand than I would have if they had bet according to their actual hand strength, and until I jammed on him and saw what he had, I wasn’t sure whether I was ahead in the hand or not. In other words, their play lead me to make what can only be described as a questionable call where I felt like there was a pretty good chance I was making a big mistake, and that’s exactly what you want your opponents to feel like when you’re bluffing them. It didn’t work out for V in this particular case, but nonetheless I think they played the bluff quite well.
River Td, V has improved to two pair, TT88, but my AA88 is better and I double up, taking in a pot of 1,974,000 chips. Which is quite enough for me, I’ve hit my goal for this table and in less than 5 minutes, making a pretty dicey call on a cold read, and ended up getting lucky.
Did I know I would be good here? I didn’t. But my read nudged me just enough into the “probably good” that I was able to make the call. That said, I would have felt stupid if he’d been holding an 8 or two hearts and I made the same play. You may call that “outcome oriented thinking” if you want to, but really it’s just how I’d feel about blowing the read. But reads are seldom 100%.
I think I read the situation well enough that I can say this a good bluff catch to make, but against a player ranked in the top 1000 or so, I might have played a bit differently, expecting that they have the flush on the Turn, or flopped trips and are betting their hand strength appropriately. So this play with T9o drawing to the flush would have been a much better bluff to play with a more credible rank. Rank doesn’t mean all that much on this site, but it doesn’t mean nothing. It also means that, at least against me, lower-ranked players are a bit more likely to get paid off when they do hit a strong hand. But I feel my experience on the site has given me some degree of confidence in my reads to be able to make calls here and be right often enough to be +EV doing so.
Still, when you make plays like this, you’re going to have to realize that there’s bound to be a lot of variance. Since I don’t like losing lots of chips to variance, I don’t like to stick around after I take a windfall pot like this. My reasoning is that my opponent’s play style is likely to get even more aggro and tilted, which can make a player harder to read, and it’s a matter of time before they take back a big chunk of it with another wild hand. True, I could win a few hands like these, but my luck doesn’t usually run that good. The surest way to hold onto the chips that come to me this way is to get them off the table as quickly as possible.
I think you’re missing some of the most profitable opportunities in poker if you make a habit of leaving after winning a big pot. Simply put, after losing a big pot, many players tend to play worse. Their decisions are made in response to the emotions they are feeling, rather than the logic of what plays will make the most money.
If you play at a level within your bank roll, you also shouldn’t have to worry about variance. While I understand that variance is hard emotionally, and so if you are playing for a relaxing experience you might want to avoid it, there are a lot of very high variance spots that are among the most profitable in poker. A tilted player will indeed often play more aggressively, and this will lead to a lot of variance. But assuming my goal is to win chips, there’s no one I’d rather have at the table than someone tilting. Note that I avoid trying to deliberately tilt people, as I think deliberately trying to enrage someone is wrong on levels that are quite a bit more important than winning play money chips, but if someone can’t control their own emotions after losing a big pot in poker normally… there’s a table I want a seat at.
You’re probably right.
I do see it all the time. I experience it all the time the other way – I lose 4-6 stacks going all in with what looks like strong hands only to watch every draw fill, or get coolered by opponent having flopped a full house when I finally hit my flush. I shove AK and get called by 45 and they make straight on the river after I flopped top pair. Then I go on tilt for a while, shoving top pair or bottom pair, just to see if there’s an amount I can bet that will get any opponent to fold, and they don’t, and I lose another 5 stacks in 5 minutes.
Then I play good poker again and make it back over the nest couple of days.
I could in theory do the same thing right back to people. But when I call wide, I lose big. If I’m on a table with a tilted shove-happy player who I’ve just taken to the cleaners, all I seem capable of doing is feeding them 2 or 3 stacks as I try to exploit their supposed tilt proclivity to bleed chips.
Such is life at the tables when you’re Cursed. If this situation worked for me I could probably spin up some 10M chip days like I watch a lot of other good players do.
PUG #11
I have AKo, and miss. On the Turn, the board pairs, 5s. I bet and get most of the table to fold, but one player calls. On the river I go for a full pot bluff bet and they fold, taking a pot of 147k. I’m hoping to rep trip 555s, and that I can get any 3 or 8 to fold. I’m not sure I can get a Q to fold often enough for a bluff here to be profitable against that hand, although if they believe that I do have a 5, maybe that can happen. But if I had to guess what my opponent folded, it would be two hearts or two diamonds.
Difficult to know what he had. It could have been something like AJ or AT, so it may not have been a bluff as you may have been ahead anyway.
I play mostly, well exclusively, in tournaments, but it amazes me how many players on RP will limp a hand for 1BB and then call a bet of 6BB preflop with the same hand. I don’t really get it, because if I have a so-so hand like J9 suited that I want to play from whatever position, then I will nearly always raise preflop to make sure that I either win a decent sized pot if I take it down on the flop or take down the pot preflop.
Also the preflop raise makes it much easier to represent a big hand on the flop with a continuation bet.
With the limp-call strategy you cut yourself off from so many options and simply rely on luck in making good hands on the flop or later streets, which is no way to play poker.
Additionally, if you raise preflop and get reraised, you can decide whether to fold, or call the raise, but be aware that the hands you are most likely up against are large pocket pairs or good aces and that hitting top pair on the flop with J9 may not be enough as you may be up against AJ or better.
By always using the limp-call strategy you lose so much information. Obviously your hand is well-disguised when you hit a set on the flop with a pocket pair, but I don’t think this happens frequently enough to be profitable. On the other hand, if you raise preflop with 55 and get one caller with AK or AQ, you may miss the flop, but still be able to take down the pot.
I think the turn bet is probably something you can mix in from time to time, but I think the river bet is probably a money loser, especially at that size. Think of the range that calls, and the range that folds.
I think the folding range is made up mostly of the busted draws, and a few simply silly hands that should have never called the turn bet. The range that calls is overwhelmingly ahead of you, and the range that folds is mostly behind. You earn a little bit getting a small number of better hands to fold, but I think the combos that call and beat you likely exceed the combos that beat you but fold.
Even if this part ends up being closer than I’d imagine, you are throwing away a lot of show down value by turning this hand into a bluff. I think you were ahead on the river a majority of the time with AK, and have hands in your range that would be better bluff candidates (for example, a busted draw of your own).
On the plus side, AK does block AQ and KQ, reducing some of the value likely to call. But I still think you’ll have better hands in your range to make this bluff with (a lot of your busted draws will also block some of your opponent’s calling combos).
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